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How Do You Know If Your Jealousy Has Gone Too Far?

eharmony Staff

September 8, 2011

Jealousy…is a mental cancer. ~B.C. Forbes

Jealousy will make you crazy. When you are in its grip the feeling is almost unbearable. It can make you physically sick and unable to focus on anything else. Jealousy will compel you to do things and say things you will later regret and you can never take back. Jealousy can single-handedly destroy a good relationship.

If you have a boyfriend or husband that openly flirts with other women or whom you know is cheating, you would have to be made of stone not to feel hurt and betrayed. Here jealousy is a natural response. But when jealousy is self-created, unrelated to reality, it acts like a poison that takes over your life and destroys your self-esteem. The jealousy I’m referring to is based on fear, not on fact, a green monster that you create out of your own imagination.

I have worked with many women who make excuses for their jealous behavior. They try to justify the actions they take when they spy on their men as if they are not responsible for their jealousy. But the truth is jealousy feels bad. It is unattractive and kills the love in a relationship.

2) You can’t stop yourself from checking his call history and listening to his phone messages behind his back.

3)You constantly call or text him during the day just to find out where he is.

If you said yes to even one of these questions, you are in trouble. When you start messing around in your man’s personal business, you have lost control of your dignity and your pride. Your relationship now lacks one of the most important qualities it needs to thrive: trust. Even if he gives you a reason to be suspicious, you are still responsible for how you behave in the relationship.

So what can you do to get rid of the jealousy that is sucking the energy and happiness out of your life? You have to attack jealousy at its root. Jealousy is about how you feel about you more than how your man feels about you. If you find yourself obsessing on his life and what he’s doing, it’s a sure sign you are not paying enough attention to your own.